


Tiebreaker

by BrokeTheLights



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angels, Aziraphale's Bookshop (Good Omens), Cosmic problems, Demons, Earth, Gay, Gen, Heaven, Hell, Homosexual agenda, No Romance, One-Shot, Talking about gay, Tipping of scales, Whether or not being gay is a sin, but then I didn't finish it for a full year, honestly this was just me coming up with something and writing it down in the same day, so enjoy!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-09-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:02:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrokeTheLights/pseuds/BrokeTheLights
Summary: Heaven and Hell have a grapple over the question, 'is it gay to be gay?', and Heaven forces its favourite angel to deal with it.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	Tiebreaker

“Please, can you just get me through-”

“No, I’m sorry, but there’s just nothing I can do at the moment, I’m sorry-”

“I just really need to get this form through and ask-”

“Yes I know, but there’s a shut-down right now and nothing is going through, so for right now you’re simply going to have to hold tight.”

Aziraphale huffed. He had wanted to hand in his reports and get a paper signed, so that he could finally relax on Earth for a couple months without interruption. He’d been looking forward to spending some time in his bookshop alone, undisturbed by humanity, leaving only to go out with Crowley to a fancy new sushi place just down the way. However, the receptionist angel stationed on the very edge of Heaven, who usually took his forms with no problems, was being rather argumentative that day, and Aziraphale was quickly getting annoyed.

With a small sigh, he finally backed down and walked a short way away from the receptionist. He knew he wasn’t going to win that argument, and thought it best to at least try and save a little bit of his temper. Besides, if something really was clogging up the system that was Heaven then it wasn’t the receptionist’s fault anyways. He looked down at the papers in his hand, and wondered what could _possibly_ be holding up Heaven and all of its higher ups so badly as to block all reports.

“Aziraphale!”

The angel jumped at the sound of his name, then spun around. He saw the stiff form of the Archangel Gabriel moving towards him quickly, and waved his paper-laiden hand at him despite his sinking heart. One of the reasons he did most of his business away from the rest of Heaven was because Gabriel rarely if ever came to the outer limits - not that Aziraphale would ever admit to such a thing.

“Oh, ah, hello Gabriel,” he said, once the other was close enough to hear him.

“Yes, hello,” Gabriel greeted. “It’s a surprise to find you up here, though I guess it shouldn’t be,” he gave a tight gesture at Aziraphale’s papers. “But I digress. I actually, uh, have a bit of a… predicament.”

“Is that so?” said Aziraphale as he arched an eyebrow.

“Yes. Now, you know a fair amount about humans, correct?”

“Uh, yes,” said Aziraphale, wondering where this was going.

“Then you know,” said Gabriel as he leaned in almost conspiratorially, “that they do _stuff_ in their free time.”

“Um.” Aziraphale glanced around for a second. “Yes?”

“And you understand how they, you know, _reproduce_ , correct?”

Aziraphale blushed lightly. “Oh, ah, well I’m not an expert in _that_ regard, but I do know of how it’s _done_ , yes.”

Gabriel nodded. “Yes, yes, of course. I’m sure you have no first-hand experience, we’ll leave that to the demons! Besides, we wouldn’t want to sully our corporeal bodies with such indignities. I mean, it’s hardly _clean_!”

Aziraphale’s blush deepened slightly. “I suppose it’s not.”

“Right.” Gabriel leaned back, his signature smile stuck on his face. “But you know how they do it, then.”

“I think I must,” replied Aziraphale. He was seriously starting to question the breakfast he had that morning. His mind rushed to think of what could possibly have made Gabriel come to _him_ and talk about _this_ , of all things.

Gabriel nodded again. “Now, the predicament I’m in, it has something to do with that.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. Now you understand how doing _it_ too much is a sin for humans? They can be locked out of Heaven for having it a lot?”

“I- yes, of course.”

“And that if they go around doing it just for, let’s say, _fun_ purposes, whatever that means, then they can also be sent Down Below?”

It was now Aziraphale’s turn to nod. “Mm-hm.”

“Okay, good.” Gabriel looked past Aziraphale for a moment too long, which made Aziraphale shift slightly, uncomfortable. Then the Archangel shifted his focus back onto Aziraphale. “On that topic, then, you understand how certain humans can have, ah, _preferences_ , correct?”

Aziraphale frowned. There were a lot of things humans had preferences on, especially when it came to Gabriel’s chosen topic, so Aziraphale found himself confused by Gabriel’s question. “What do you mean by that?”

Just as Gabriel took in a hefty breath to try and restate his question, someone from behind Gabriel cried out, “Gabriel, for Heaven’s sake!”

Gabriel turned slightly to look behind him, and Aziraphale peaked around the other angel from his left, thoroughly confused. The Archangel Michael swiftly made her way towards the pair of them, frustration written all over her face. She finally made it to them, then gave Gabriel an exasperated look.

“If you’re not going to _spit it out_ , then I’ll say it!”

Gabriel tightened his lips, then moved out of the way so that Michael could face Aziraphale head on. Aziraphale stared at her.

“Michael? What is going on?” asked Aziraphale.

“What Gabriel was _trying_ to express was that we as Heaven have run into the moral question of whether or not homosexual behaviour and closely related indentity issues are a sin or not,” said Michael with conviction.

Finally Aziraphale’s face gave in fully to his blush. “Ah- um, I- okay?”

“And the issue,” Michael powered on, “is that we have a perfect divide between everyone in Heaven on whether or not it should be deemed so.

“Alright,” said Aziraphale as he struggled to cool off his flaming face. “And why have you come to me on this… issue? Why not just ask the Almighty and be done with it?”

“That’s another part of the issue,” Gabriel butted in. “We have tried contacting Her, but She didn’t respond. In fact, the Metatron informed us that not even the highest angels are allowed to view Her at this time, in case they try and ask Her to solve this, uh, predicament.”

“So we have been forced to take a vote,” Michael said, “and as I’ve already said, the vote came to a draw. Heaven is split _perfectly in half_ over this, and absolutely _no one_ is willing to change their vote.”

“Is that why I couldn’t hand in my reports?” asked Aziraphale, as he looked down at the papers in his hand.

“Most likely,” nodded Michael.

There was a pause in the conversation, then something dawned on Aziraphale. “Wait, you said everyone voted, yes? But I can assure you that I was not informed of this process until just a few seconds ago. I’ve been on Earth, erm, thwarting evil and such, and haven’t cast my vote.”

This time both Archangels nodded at the same time, then Michael opened her mouth. “That is precisely why we have come to you in the first place. You, Aziraphale, are the tiebreaker.”

Aziraphale suddenly went very pale.

“Oh dear,” he murmured.

Gabriel levelled him with a cold stare as Michael stepped closer. “So, Aziraphale, what is your answer? Which way shall the scales tip?”

Aziraphale suddenly felt as if the entirety of Heaven was watching him from all sides, and gulped. He fidgeted under the intense gazes he found himself trapped under. He knew he didn’t want to outright say what he thought, as on an issue such as this, either answer could land him in a world of trouble with one entire half of Heaven. He knew which side he _wanted_ to take; that of the angels who had voted that anything to do with the homosexual and otherwise agenda was fine, and shouldn’t be classified a sin. But he was almost certain that the two Archangels before him would disagree, and once he cast his vote, once Heaven was in a state of peace once again, they would punish him for choosing what they considered the _wrong_ side. Then, an idea dawned on him.

“Um, well, what about what the other side thinks?”

“What?” Gabriel said in a flat voice.

“Well.” Aziraphale steeled himself, and cleared his throat. “I was just thinking that we have to make sure that people go to the right places, right? Which means that we need to know what is and isn’t a sin, right? But what if, whichever way we decide, is actually the opposite of what the other side thinks, and now they have people who are supposed to be up here because of how we’ve ruled?”

“Are you suggesting that we should go ask what Hell thinks on this issue?” Michael asked with a scandalised air.

Aziraphale nodded quickly. “Yes, just so.”

Michael and Gabriel exchanged a glance, then Gabriel said, “Why?”

Aziraphale stifled a sigh. “So that we get the right people, the right souls, and they get the right souls. And I was thinking that we could do what we did here, and give all of their side a chance to vote, so that we get a definite answer, and then it won’t matter what I think, in the end, about this whole situation, and the universe can keep on moving.”

Another pause followed Aziraphale’s words as the Archangels considered what he had just said, then Gabriel slowly started to nod. “You know what, Aziraphale, I think this is one of the only hypotheticals that you’ve ever brought forth that could actually work.”

Michael turned to Gabriel. “You think it could?”

Gabriel gave one solid nod, his mind made up. “Yes, I think it’s potentially a good plan. So that we have all of the human souls that are supposed to come to us and they have all of them that are supposed to go to them.”

Michael gave a small nod herself. “Alright, fine. I suppose we could try this out.” She rounded on Aziraphale, who had been slowly inching backwards to try and escape. “You will have to lead the voting down below, then, since this is your idea.”

Aziraphale gave a withered smile. “Yes, I suppose that makes sense.”

Then, finally, the Archangels left, and Aziraphale let out a breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding. This was going to be tricky, getting every demon in Hell to decide if this issue was a sin or not. First things first, he thought, contact Crowley about the new situation he found himself in.

Aziraphale called Crowley from his bookshop in Soho, his reports and papers set aside for the time being on a stand next to his tea pot, and soon enough found himself in a small sushi restaurant, though it hadn’t been chosen by the angel. The place itself was actually picked out by Crowely, but Aziraphale wasn’t going to complain.

“Mmh, this is scrumptious, Crowley, absolutely delightful,” said Aziraphale as he patted his lips with a napkin. The demon simply leaned back and watched.

Then Aziraphale remembered why he was there, and cleared his throat as he placed his next helping down. Crowley straightened up a little in his seat. “Now then, I seem to find myself in a, um, predicament.”

“Oh yeah?” Crowley gave Aziraphale a smirk. “And it’s something you figure I can help you get out of?”

“I sure hope so,” Aziraphale sighed. “I don’t think I can rally all of Hell to commit to engaging in one very important vote, especially if it’s for the greater good.”

Crowley scrunched his nose. “Not if you put it like that.”

“But that’s the thing,” exclaimed Aziraphale, “there’s no possible other way to put it!”

Crowley rolled his eyes. “Well why don’t we determine how to phrase it when both of us know what the blasted predicament is in the first place.”

“Right, of course,” amended the angel, “I’m sorry, my dear. The issue is that of human behaviour.”

“It always is, isn’t it?”

Aziraphale gave a soft chuckle, then glanced around for a second before he continued. “It seems so. I’m just going to be completely straight with you, here, Crowley; the thing that Heaven has itself all tied up on is the question of whether or not homosexual humans and those within that community are all committing sins on a constant basis, just for the fact that they are engauging in activities that could potentially be seen as frivolous and inexcusable. Such as, you know, doing _it_ without any ‘real’ reason to. Apparently they got absolutely everyone to vote, but still somehow ended up in a tie. Do you understand what I’m saying here?”

Crowley nodded slowly, mulling over what Aziraphale had given him, then said, “Heaven can’t decide if being gay and having gay sex and kissing the same gender are sins, they can’t decide if knowing yourself to be a gender different than the bits you were born with is a sin, is that what you’re saying?”

Aziraphale sighed. “Yes, I suppose that’s exactly it.”

“And now they’re wanting Hell to vote, because they came to a draw?”

“That’s right.”

Crowley took a couple seconds to consider this, then looked Aziraphale dead in the eyes. “And how did you vote on this?”

“That’s the thing that got me into all this mess in the first place,” said Aziraphale, “I never voted.”

Crowley frowned and rolled his eyes, then looked away. “So you’re supposed to be acting as the tiebreaker? Then why didn’t you just place your ballot?”

He then looked back over at the angel across from him, and hummed as he figured out why before Aziraphale had a chance to respond. The two of them sat in relative silence for a number of minutes, considering their options and listening to the background noise of the restaurant. Then Crowley spoke up again.

“So you’re wanting me to ask all of Hell to vote on this matter for you?”

“Well when you put it like that it seems like an impossible task,” Aziraphale sighed, “but I don’t know what I could possibly do besides this. The Archangels have already decided my idea is the best course of action anyways, so it’s not like I can go back up there and give them an answer from me now.”

Crowley smirked. “They really put you in a right mess, huh?”

“Mm-hm,” said Aziraphale with little enthusiasm.

“And I’m sure my people would absolutely _love_ to be bossed around by either the likes of you or me, seeing as you are an angel and I am not what they would consider one of the most powerful demons out there.” Aziraphale frowned at Crowley’s comment. “I mean, I’m sure this’ll be easy.”

“Please Crowley, do try and be a little more serious, this is keeping the fate of hundreds upon thousands of humans undecided, doomed to Purgatory until we can get this sorted out.”

“Fine, fine,” the demon waved his hands in the air, “I can try and see what I can do, you know, discuss with Beelzebub and such. Maybe you should go back up to your people and ask one of your superiors if they could phone down to my lot to make my job a little easier, since our higher powers seem to listen solely to those on it’s same level.”

“Oh yes, I can’t see how that would hurt,” Aziraphale smiled, his worries easing out slightly. “Thank you very much, Crowley, I don’t know how I would do this without you.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Crowley muttered, “just don’t let it get back to anyone that I’m helping you.”

They sat for a couple more seconds after Aziraphale agreed to Crowley’s loose conditions before the silence was broken between them again.

“I’m sure you can’t verbally answer without tipping things one way or another,” Crowley began, “but I just want to make sure we’re on the same page here. If this scale is tilted to the side of it being a sin, it would mean thousands of people, _at least_ , would be doomed from the moment they’re born, and while I’m all for adding to Hell’s ranks, I just think that that’s a little unfair, wouldn’t you?”

Aziraphale was still for a moment as he cast another glance around, then looked Crowley in what he thought were the demon’s eyes behind his shades. He then looked down, and gave a subtle nod. Crowley seemed to relax a bit, then gave three strong nods of his own.

“Good, good, I just wanted to make sure.”

The silence between them was thick as they waited for something to happen, then Crowley declared it was as good a time as any to be off, claiming that he might as well get on with his impossible task as quickly as possible. Crowley left Aziraphale alone at the table, and the angel gave a weak smile. He hoped that Crowley would be able to convince as many demons as possible to vote, and while he knew it wouldn’t be easy, he hoped that with a little finagling Hell would be convinced and the universe once again wouldn’t entirely care about what exactly Aziraphale was thinking and doing at every given moment.

🖚O🖙

It had taken about two weeks, but Crowley, with the help of a couple impersonated phone calls to Heaven and some threats directed towards some weaker demons, had finally managed to get Hell to vote. It was a strange experience, he had to admit, as he walked down one of the usually empty but now positively crowded grimy, disheartening hallways with a ballot in hand and directions to the newly made voting hall. Not for as long as he could remember had Hell ever come together to right an issue that originated in Heaven, taking into account the issue’s cosmic nature.

Crowley could take a pretty good guess at how most of the demons he knew would be voting. Hell was a place that hungered for more souls to torture and mutilate, more victims to join in their cause against the Guy in the Sky. They would undoubtedly be voting for the subject, even if they didn’t understand it, to be a sin.

However, Crowley didn’t think that it was in the best interests of either side for innocent people to be cast out of the pearly gates just for something they couldn’t control, and while he would never admit it to anyone except maybe Aziraphale, he was voting for the topic to not be a sin. It just wasn’t fair for a human to not even get a chance to go up to Heaven, he thought, and besides, if homosexuality and everything involved with it became a sin, it could put Aziraphale’s angel status in jeapordy, which wasn’t a risk Crowley was willing to take. They’d already gotten so far, he didn’t want everything to fall apart just yet.

So thus, Crowley’s shoes clicked on the dirty tiles in the packed hallway and into the hall as he made his way to the ballot box, shoved and bustled all the way. The usually bored-looking Prince of Hell, Beelzebub, was keeping a stern eye on the box, of which only one stood in the centre of the hall. Crowley watched as some random demon tried to cheat, and was instantly squished under a gigantic high-heeled shoe that suddenly appeared, then vanished just as suddenly. The demon was scraped up by the beat-up and bruised janitorial staff not even a second later. In any other circumstance, Crowley would have found the squished demon somewhat amusing, but he was trying to keep his head down, so he refrained from snickering as he joined the long waiting line of demons with their ballots in their hands.

One by one, every single demon in front of him voted. A few tried to make a run for it, apparently desperately not wanting to partake in whatever form of universal democracy happened to be taking place, but were met with a fate worse than those who tried to cheat, as their annihilated physical forms were carried off in dust pans and their souls forced into an adjacent room. Crowley shivered to think about what exactly was happening in that room.

Finally, however, the ballet box awaited his approach as Crowley neared the beginning of the line. Though time meant next to nothing in Hell and the state of limbo it seemed to have been put in, Crowley could feel the skin of his feet rubbing off just enough to be sore for the next 11 months at least, and he sighed as he thought about putting them up and napping for a year. The ballet box called to him, and he approached it with envious eyes watching how it sat upon the table and mocked him with its squat, stationary form.

Within the foldout next to the box, Crowley set his ballet down, unfolded it, then picked up the pen next to it. It was an uncomfortable pen, too thick for his surprisingly thin hands but not thick enough to hold confidently with a fisted grip, and as Crowley struggled to keep it in his grasp and write with good enough proficiency, he thought about going up to Earth and picking out a fine, beautiful pen just to spite the ballet box pen. He shook his head as he finished crossing out his options, and considered how silly it was to buy a better pen just to spite a different one, for it was an inanimate object without feelings, unlike his dear plants.

He then set the uncomfortable pen down in the same awkward spot it had been in when he had picked it up just to annoy the demons behind him, and folded his ballet up just enough that any demons trying to peak into his hands couldn’t see his vote. The paper suddenly felt very heavy in his hands, as though his choice was about to affect more people, more _human beings_ , than he could ever imagine, and he glanced at it as he began to slip it into the box. There was a split second where he considered ripping it up and going with the choice that almost every other demon he knew would choose, considered being a better demon for once in his long, arduous, sinful life, but as soon as the split second was over he rammed the ballet into the box, and decidedly spun away from it. He’d made his choice and he would stick with it, he wasn’t Aziraphale with his fluffy words and back-and-forth nature. For him, there was never any turning back, on anything, he’d fired his shot and all he could do now was wait for the result.

As he promptly made his way out of the voting room, Crowley noticed that the number of demons who were voting had dropped substantially. He hadn’t realised that there hadn’t actually been that many behind him in the first place, and being faced with the end of the vote already gave him shivers down his spine. He was nervous as the energy of the universe built up inside his bones, and he couldn’t help but wonder just what the outcome would be. Surely, the majority of demons would vote for anything to be a sin, surely the only thing his fellow sin-filled creatures cared about was gaining more twisted and corrupted souls. Surely, they wouldn’t care that the humans they got and tortured for eternity were innocent people who may have lived perfectly virtuous lives and were only sent down due to the very nature of who they were.

Wishing to be out of Hell once more as quickly as possible, Crowley made his way to his flat in record time. He wasn’t sure what would happen when the voting drew to an end, but he was sure that he didn’t particularly want to be there when it did. There was an air of subtle fear, which of course was common in Hell, but the fear was different, it _felt_ different, and Crowley didn’t like it. He’d begun pacing his fat when his phone began to ring.

Startled, Crowley paced over to the phone, and, with a bit of hesitation beforehand, snatched it up and jammed it against his ear.

“What?”

“Oh, you choose to pick up for the first time in at least three hundred years,” a voice sneered on the other end, and Crowley bit back a subtle curse as he waited for Hastur to finish up and get off his line in case anyone of _importance_ wished to call him. “Beelzebub has demanded that we and a couple others start phoning around, see if anyone wants to change their vote.”

“Why?” Crowley snapped, bristling at the idea of doing such a thing.

“I think you can guess why, Crawley,” Hastur said with a strange lilt in his voice which made Crowley frown.

“Humour me,” Crowley responded, ignoring Hastur’s use of his old, old name.

Hastur huffed out something that could’ve been equated to a laugh, then compiled. “Vote’s at a dead draw. And no one wants to change their vote, not even any of us, not even the Prince of Flies. Strangest thing I’ve ever had the misfortune of seeing.”

“Mark me as another not wanting to change my ballet,” Crowley muttered, though Hastur seemed to hear him as the other demon gave a long, drawn out sigh, then mumbled something to someone away from the phone receiver. “Has any word been sent skyward?”

“Why should you care?” Hastur growled, then hung up. Crowley simply stared into space for a couple seconds before he touched the receiver and picked it up again, already dialing a different, memorised number.

🖚O🖙

As he placed the phone back down into its reciever, Aziraphale’s stomach tied itself into knots, and he began to pace his bookshop floor. He tried to figure out just what the odds were that both Heaven _and Hell_ would wind up in a perfect stalemate, split completely in half and in need of him to finally break the tie, _again_ . He very much disliked this amount of pressure being thrust onto his shoulders, and mentally he scolded himself for even suggesting having the other side vote. He could have just had half of Heaven angry at him and have left it at that. Now he’ll have half of Heaven and half of Hell mad at him, and all he could possibly fret about was the horrible _paperwork_ that would come out of this.

He was very harshly broken out of his thoughts, however, when he was suddenly yanked from his little bookshop by a greater power and pulled into a celestial plane that was neither Heaven nor Hell. Stars surrounded him from all sides, and his wings, which had suddenly appeared behind him, kept him from falling into oblivion.

Aziraphale was nearly breathless. “What-”

“A conclusion has come,” said someone in the void, and suddenly Aziraphale was aware of two people before him.

Beelzebub stood, looking rather annoyed, next to Gabriel, who wore a similar expression. Gabriel tapped a foot harshly into the nothingness.

Beelzebub spoke. “Hell has come to a draw.”

Gabriel sighed. “Your plan failed, Aziraphale. You must decide which stance you take, and finally end this issue.”

A million voices erupted out of the void, and Aziraphale saw all of the angels and demons of all the realms appear around him, replacing the stars. They all looked unsettled, but just as equally, they all appeared to want an answer. Aziraphale noticed that there was a distinct lack of presence from God and Satan.

Aziraphale nervously considered everyone as he fiddled with the buttons down his front, then his eyes landed on a familiar face. Crowley was tucked within the crowd, his eyes covered by his glasses and a small smirk on his face. Aziraphale found a little comfort in knowing that Crowley was there, but it wasn’t enough to make him feel truly any better about his predicament.

“Oh dear,” muttered Aziraphale under his breath.

Then he tore his eyes away from the demon as his hands fidgeted with the buttons on his jacket. He desperately wished that both Heaven and Hell could have been just slightly better at making decisions. Then he wouldn’t have had to have been there in the first place.

He drew in a breath, and instantly everyone went quiet. The silence rang through the cosmos, and Aziraphale, suddenly startled, faltered.

“Uh.”

His voice like raindrops fell hard and fast throughout the universe as every being that ever existed listened to its uncertain tones, and he shivered. Then he collected himself, and straightened himself out. He noticed that all the movement from the collected angels and demons had instantly stopped, and he imagined them as nothing more than shopping window dummies.

“It’s all down to me, right?” he called over to Gabriel and Beelzebub in what he hoped was a brave voice. “How this whole issue is going to be settled?”

The pair of them only nodded, and Aziraphale wondered if they were able to speak at all in that moment. The thought unsettled him a little, but he ignored it.

“Well then. I hope that no one gets too angry at my decision. You all must understand that I, uh, _have_ to choose one way or another, and I mean it as no disrespect to anyone, at all. It has been a very long week and I think that, well, that I’m the only one who can do anything at his point.” Aziraphale dropped his hands from his buttons, and subsequently dropped padding his own words. “My decision is that the homosexual and otherwise agenda is…”

Aziraphale paused dramatically, and the whole universe stopped as it waited hungrily for his answer. All eyes from every realm were on him, all on the edges of their metaphorical seats, and even time took a knee to wait for the final answer. Pressure built up as reality seemed to stand in the balance and Aziraphale’s ears very nearly popped from its power. The angel could feel the force of will that everyone was desperately trying to exude upon him, to make him have a last minute change of heart one way or another, but Aziraphale held strong to his answer as a headache threatened to form around the incredible force, and finally, he gave his vote.

“… not a sin.”

Finally, every eye blinked simultaneously, and the entire universe began to spin once more. Earth’s creatures and beings from other planets alike took a deep breath they hadn’t known they were holding, and the angels and demons all but vanished from the cosmic plane. The intense, pounding energy that had built up had finally released, and had decided that it was going to go put out a couple stars before it completely vanished. Aziraphale himself was sent back to his little bookshop in Soho within the span of a snap, feeling very worn out and just a little proud of his performance.

He knew that at some point, _someone_ was going to come for him for casting his vote, whether they be angelic or demonic. But in his bookshop, alone with his books, he felt like he didn’t much care. He could prepare for them, and he felt like he had done the universe a great justice*.

Suddenly, a bright light from above rained down upon him, and Aziraphale was plucked from his bookshop again (Aziraphale had half a mind to ask the powers that be to _knock_ before they picked him from his home for a third time, since they seemed to like doing it so often), and placed in Heaven, staring up upon the blinding majesty that was God.

Instantly, Aziraphale dropped to a bow, shocked that he was brought there, and confused as to who brought him. As he contemplated what exactly to do with himself (for he had never physically met God like this), he heard a soft chuckling.

“Aziraphale,” said God, “you have done a very good thing.”

“O-oh, I have?” asked Aziraphale to his toes.

“Yes. Stand up, Aziraphale.”

Aziraphale nearly snapped his corporeal body’s back with the speed that he ascended from his bow. He winced slightly, then played it off as though Her light was too bright for him by shading his eyes with his hand. This was, to be fair to him, sort of true. He couldn’t actually see Her properly, Her light was too all-encompassing, and he most definitely could not see Her eyes.

God gave off the impression that She was smiling. “I wanted to commend you for what you have done first-hand, Aziraphale. Standing before all the angels and demons in the universe must not have been easy for you.”

“Ah, well, uh, not really, no.”

“But you persevered, and made the right decision. I’m proud of you, Aziraphale.”

Aziraphale’s cheeks turned pink, and he wrung his hands. “O-oh, uh… really?”

God didn’t respond, but the angel could feel a warm shift in the air around him, and his heart began to soar. He felt it swell in his chest, then gave another, more stilted and quick bow. 

“I- thank you.”

He knew that the feeling that had suddenly sprouted in his chest was something that he could never truly describe, something that was perfectly ineffable, but for the time being, he settled on calling it nerves and a happiness that came from being told that he was doing something or being someone worth being proud of.

“Would you like to know a secret, Aziraphale?” God asked, in a tone that was anything but serious.

Aziraphale’s eyes widened, and he removed his hand from where he had replaced it on his forehead. He instantly regretted doing so, but resigned himself to simply wincing into God’s light.

“Secret? As in a secret kept from everyone else? Why would you want to tell me a secret? Wouldn’t-”

God stopped his oncoming vocal avalanche. “You ask many questions, Aziraphale, but have given no answer.”

Aziraphale gulped. “Y-yes, I would be honoured to hear your secret.”

“I never quite intended you to be the tiebreaker. I had planned to have _someone_ make the final decision, of course, but I left it to the rest of the universe to decide who that would be, and the fate of which way many millions of souls would go,” said God.

Aziraphale frowned. “Whatever do you mean?”

“I mean that there is something about you that the universe has taken a liking to.” There was a gap in Her words that Aziraphale picked up on, and the thought of _so don’t go screwing it up_ came to mind, though the angel wasn’t sure if it came from himself or Her. “That goes the same with that demon you have taken to meeting up with.”

“Ah, I, um, I am just making sure that-”

“I know, Aziraphale. While it may be of concern to my angels, it worries me not how long you know him, so long as he does not persuade you to Fall.”

The angel hopped from one foot to the other. “I-I promise you, I have no intention of joining him, um, Down Below.”

God gave another chuckle. “I know. Now, I shall let you get back to your business on Earth. There is still much to accomplish, and there is a stray hardcover in your shop that is in the wrong section.”

“Oh, um, thank you, my Lord,” said Aziraphale as he gave yet another bow, “you are very gracious, my Lord.”

Then, instantly, Aziraphale was right back inside his cozy little shop, and as the light faded from his shoulders, the angel’s mind was sent whizzing with questions that he had no answer to. The feeling in his chest had yet to subside, but Aziraphale was unsure what to do about it. He decided that everything could be sorted out later, however, when he had calmed down just a touch, and immediately figured that the best course of action was to find which book the Almighty had said was out of place. He prided himself on having a very organized bookshop, even if humans couldn’t figure out his methods, and wished that visitors to his shop would simply ask where they first pulled the book off the shelves from. He found it within a number of hours, by which time Crowley had come around and had a hearty drink, and together they talked about what exactly had happened. Crowley, to Aziraphale’s delight, brought the attention off of what Aziraphale had been doing in that moment, and put it on himself, and how apparently beforehand, all the demons of Hell had been a struggle to get to cooperate with each other.

Little did they know what their future held, and what part, no matter how small, they may play to change the fate of the world. It would happen in all due time, and in Berkeley Square, a nightingale began making a nest in jovial quiet, having just discovered the best spot in the park to sing.

**Author's Note:**

> *Though it should be noted that Aziraphale still knew he couldn't fight everyone, and worried heavily about what they would do to his precious books once they finally got to him.
> 
> It has taken me so long, and this draft has sat in my Drive for so long, that at this point I might as well finish it and put it out there, so here you all are! I hope you all enjoy it, I hope the characters are at least somewhat in-character. This all takes place before the apocalypse that wasn't, as the last line especially suggests, but I thought I would clarify that here. Thank you so much for reading, and I'll see you in the next one!


End file.
